A Donald Trump-appointed federal judge has dismissed the case brought by the Department of Justice against the entire Maryland judiciary over a standing order that bars the government from deporting undocumented immigrants for at least one day after they file a legal challenge to their detention.
U.S. District Judge Thomas Cullen called the Trump administration’s attacks on district judges across the country a “smear” and “unprecedented and unfortunate.”
“Indeed, over the past several months, principal officers of the Executive (and their spokespersons) have described federal district judges across the country as ‘left-wing,’ ‘liberal,’ ‘activists,’ ‘radical,’ ‘politically minded,’ ‘rogue,’ ‘unhinged,’ ‘outrageous, overzealous, [and] unconstitutional,’ ‘[c]rooked,’ and worse,” Cullen wrote in a footnote. “Although some tension between the coordinate branches of government is a hallmark of our constitutional system, this concerted effort by the Executive to smear and impugn individual judges who rule against it is both unprecedented and unfortunate.”
Cullen issued an order dismissing the case, concluding the lawsuit presents a “nonjusticiable dispute between two co-equal branches of government.” He added that the judges are “absolutely immune” from the lawsuit because it stems from an act of the court.
“Any fair reading of the legal authorities cited by Defendants leads to the ineluctable conclusion that this court has no alternative but to dismiss. To hold otherwise would run counter to overwhelming precedent, depart from longstanding constitutional tradition, and offend the rule of law,” Cullen wrote.
Cullen argued the administration must find a proper way to raise their concerns with the judges in the District Court of Maryland, and wrote he doesn’t believe that should be done by suing the entire Maryland judiciary.
“Much as the Executive fights the characterization, a lawsuit by the executive branch of government against the judicial branch for the exercise of judicial power is not ordinary. The Executive’s lawsuit will be dismissed, and its motion for preliminary injunction denied as moot. Whatever the merits of its grievance with the judges of the United States District Court for the District of Maryland, the Executive must find a proper way to raise those concerns,” he wrote in the decision.
The Department of Justice seal during a news conference at the DOJ office in Washington, May 16, 2023.
Jose Luis Magana/AP, FILE
In late June, the Justice Department made the unusual move to sue the entire Maryland federal judiciary over the order barring the government from deporting undocumented immigrants for at least one day after they file a challenge.
“This lawsuit involves yet another regrettable example of the unlawful use of equitable powers to restrain the Executive,” the lawsuit read. “Specifically, Defendants have instituted an avowedly automatic injunction against the federal government, issued outside the context of any particular case or controversy … by promulgating a standing order and amended standing order that require the court clerk to automatically enter an injunction against removing, or changing the legal status of, any alien detained in Maryland who files a habeas petition.”
The standing order was implemented in May as courts across the country were seeking to manage a wave of emergency lawsuits challenging the Trump administration’s aggressive moves to deport undocumented immigrants.
The federal court in Maryland is currently home to arguably the most high-profile of these deportation cases: the one involving Kilmar Abrego Garcia.
Abrego Garcia, who was wrongly deported in March before being brought back to the U.S. to face new criminal charges, was taken into immigration custody upon checking in with Immigration and Customs Enforcement at its office in Baltimore on Monday morning and is currently being held at a detention center in Virginia, where he is again facing deportation.
ABC News’ Laura Romero and Ely Brown contributed to this report.
